First-person shooter games such as Call of Duty and Halo are examples of a popular and growing genre of the video game industry. Generally, a first-person shooter game is an action game centered on firearm and/or other projectile weapon-based combat displayed via the perspective of the gamer's avatar; that is, the in-game character controlled by a user playing the game. In the vast majority of first-person shooter games, the avatar's weapon always fires a projectile whose trajectory converges at the middle of the video display on which the game is being played.
Gamers are very competitive and continuously looking for ways to improve their game performance. It is desirable to improve first-person shooter response time and accuracy when acquiring targets. When playing a game, the gamer needs to react and aim as quickly as possible to “kill or be killed”. In most first-person shooter games, the reticle of the existing digital scope or sight may or may not be visible to the gamer depending on the background lighting of the gamer's environment or the avatar's digital environment. For example, with a reticle patterned as a crosshair, if the crosshairs are black and the gamer's avatar is in a dark area of the digital environment of the game, the crosshairs may be washed out and difficult to see, detrimentally affecting the gamer's reaction and accuracy when aiming and shooting at targets.
FIG. 1 is a perspective view showing a prior art gaming system comprising a gaming console 10 operably interconnected to a video display 12 and showing a screenshot of a first-person shooter game 14 on the video display 12. The video display 12 shown herein is provided on a television 13 but could also be provide on other electronic devices, such as a computer display or monitor. FIG. 1 shows a typical scenario when aiming down a barrel 16 of a virtual weapon 18. An in-game reticle 20 of a digital scope or sight 22 may be provided as an indicator to the gamer where the virtual weapon 18 is aimed in the digital environment. For example, as shown in FIG. 1, the virtual weapon 18 is aimed at a shooting target 24.
FIG. 2 is a representative screenshot of the example first-person shooting game 14 of FIG. 1, showing the virtual weapon 18 aimed at the middle of the video display 12. FIG. 2 shows that the screenshot and the reticle 20 of the digital sight 22 in the video game are concentric; that is, they share the same center. The center of the video display 12 in most first-person shooter games is the aiming point of the digital sight 22 during the game. In other words, the view through the digital sight 22 would be aligned with the center of the video display 12.
FIG. 3 is a schematic view of FIG. 2 with illustration lines 26, 28 conceptually showing the aiming point 32 of the weapon 18 at the middle of the video display 12. A first illustration line 26 is the line segment connecting the upper left corner of the video display 12 with the lower, right corner of the video display 12. A second illustration line 28 is the line segment connecting the upper right corner of the video display 12 with the lower left corner of the video display 12. The intersection 32 of the two illustration lines 26, 28 is located at the center of the video display 12. As shown in FIG. 3, the aiming point represented as the center of the reticle 20 of the digital sight 22 of the weapon 18 is collocated with the intersection 32 at the center of the video display 12. In FIG. 3, the reticle 20 is conceptually represented as a circle 30 surrounding a crosshair pattern. The illustration lines 26, 28 and circle 30 are not actually shown on the video display 12 while playing the first-person shooting game 14; the gamer only sees the view shown in FIG. 2.
In the past, to create a point of reference indicative of the aiming point of their weapon, gamers have used tape, decals, dry-erase markers etc. to create a mark at the center of the video display. One product available on the market, Sticky Sights (http.//www.kooleraireac.com/Sticky_Sights.htm) is a clear static-cling vinyl sticker with a printed crosshair reticle. However, Sticky Sights does not overcome the visibility issues previously attributed to the in-game reticle of a digital scope or sight. Depending upon the video game, Sticky Sights may blend in with the digital environment making the Sticky Sights' crosshairs difficult to see.